Step Around the Puddles
by Lint
Summary: A letter to the gang. Spoiler based.


Title: Step Around the Puddles  
Author: Nace M.  
Rating: R  
Summary: Letter to the gang. Based on spoilers for Alex's 'death.' Thought I'd put my own deranged spin on it.   
Warning: Not a happy fic by any means.   
***  
  
The human mind is an interesting thing. Though it is in reality, a simple mass of gray matter. Nothing more than mix of cells and substance. It provides motor functions, emotions, and instinct.   
  
Love.  
  
Entire worlds and species can be created from it. Generations of great thinkers revolutionized the world because it. The human brain is the most complex functioning thing in a carbon-based universe. The mind is a powerful tool, a destructive weapon, a storage vault of love and memories, ideas, and actions. I mean, it in a sense is you. You are what you think you are.   
  
I think therefore I am.   
  
I have something to confess.   
  
I'm not who you think I am.   
  
At a time like this confession is something that I feel will cleanse the soul. Make the vessel of my body ready for evacuation. Rid it of the demon nesting inside, taking me along for the ride. I want to be rid of this. This lie. It's all a bunch of lies. I am a bunch of lies. Nothing is real anymore. Nothing about me is real. I'm a forgery. A nice crisp new dollar bill that looks and feels real to touch but if you look closely...that's not George Washington.   
  
You have no idea what I'm talking about do you?  
  
My change in behavior just a growth in personality for me wasn't it? At least that's what you all told yourselves isn't it. Come on you guys; you've known me for years. When have I ever acted the way I've been acting? When have I ever been so smooth and cold and distant? When have I ever acted like Isabel was no big deal?   
  
I know you've all thought about this. Individually if not in-groups like we tend to do. Liz, Maria...I know you two have to have known something was wrong. Couldn't you see it in my eyes? Like there was nothing was there? I know you had to have. It's exactly what I saw when I looked in the mirror. It wasn't me staring back. Those weren't my eyes, that wasn't my face.   
  
Scandinavia doesn't cause such a change of personality. I've never been to Sweden. I don't know where those slides came from. I don't know why everything about them seemed to play like a recording out of my mouth. I don't know where I was all that time. The last thing I remember clearly was telling Liz that I was going away for awhile. I remember her telling me that Sweden was such a random place to suddenly take off for a month.   
  
I remember pictures of you all welcoming me back. That's all they were. Simple 2-D images focused in eyes that were no longer mine. I could see you, but I couldn't feel or touch. The words were not my own. The actions were not my own.   
  
It wasn't me.   
  
You know I'd never want to hurt any of you.   
  
Ever.   
  
I would never hurt anyone or anything in my entire life.  
  
But now...  
  
They want me to kill you.   
  
All of you.   
  
I see it all in my head...   
  
Every night I dream of killing you. Your lifeless bodies staring back at me, blood on my hands, that strange contentment I feel knowing that you are all dead. That I did as I was commanded and will be rewarded greatly.   
  
Its... haunting...me.   
  
Every single night it haunts me, so much so that I've considered this long before now. I want it to stop so much. I don't want to hurt you. Liz, Maria, Max, Michael, Isabel, Kyle, Tess...you're all my family. I'd do anything to protect my family. You know that. Or at least the Alex Whitman you've always known would do that. I don't know who I am anymore.   
  
The voices never stop. The commands. 'Kill them,' they say. Over and over again. A broken record inside my head. The song doesn't change. I can't get it to end. It keeps on playing no matter how much I fight. How much I try and try to think for myself. Each individual thought is like a spike in my forehead. I don't have sheets on my bed anymore. I've torn them all to shreds. You guys don't know this. You haven't been to my house in months. I want to thank for that even though it was unintentional.   
  
I don't know why they chose me. I don't know what they'll want with me if I succeed. I don't ever know if I'll get to live if I succeed.   
  
Oh god I just want it to be over.   
  
Kivar promises so much for me. He says he'll give me the world if I do this for him. He says I will be his most trusted soldier, his second in command. I'm not naive guys, you know that. The promises sound so hollow and empty, but I can't help the temptation... It's like its being fed to me. My emotions are not my own. My hands, my legs, my body is not my own. I feel like a marionette. Pull my strings and watch me move. I have no conscious, my mind is not my own. I can't stand it.   
  
Sometimes when I actually do get to sleep... I'll wake up somewhere. I don't know how I got there. I don't know why my clothes are so dirty, I don't know my there's blood on me...  
  
I don't know whom the guy or girl staring blankly, lifelessly up at me is.   
  
Their face is just one of many...   
  
Too many.   
  
I never wanted to hurt anyone...  
  
I have hurt. I have killed. It was merely practice the voices say. Let my body feel what needs to be done. They want you to be next. They demand that you be next. Humans don't matter to them. They want the four. The royal four. Earth could go to hell in a hand basket for they care...Just so long as they get what they want before it goes.   
  
Oh god why did they pick me.   
  
I'm sorry if my sweat blurs some of the letters... You don't understand the effort it's taking to write this. The pain inside my skull... Migraines can't compare. They don't want me to go through with it. My body is not my own. I am their body, their ship, and their emissary on this earth. Max has met the others. The other vessels of each world had chosen to contact and negotiate with the king. The true king. Kivar says that he is the true king. The other planets know it's not true. But Kivar is ruthless. I don't know how I know this. I had gone by this time. I'm supposed to remember the freezing cold of Stockholm. Instead I think of New York. Max met Kivar's so-called ambassador. He was merely a messenger. We've all met the skins. A pathetic army that couldn't get the job done. I'm the real vessel. I'm the real ambassador. I am supposed to do exactly what he wants. I know where the granolith is. They don't. I've somehow managed to at least keep that from them.   
  
Though, like I said.   
  
I can't fight them anymore.   
  
They are too strong. My mind is no longer my own.   
  
Does anyone have any idea what that feels like?   
  
Max, Tess, Michael, Isabel. I know you think you do. You are reincarnated yes...but you are still your own beings. You own selves. You have your own minds. Anything you feel about the past that you think control or run your life in a direction you don't want, a duty deep down you have no desire to fill. It's a facade. You want your own lives, I know that. You may know that. Yet you still let yourselves be lead around by the past you supposedly come from. Let me tell you something.   
  
They're just memories.  
  
You can go and do whatever you please. Antar doesn't matter. We're not on Antar. I mean, do you even realize how far away it actually is?   
  
Sure you have enemies.   
  
I am walking proof that they are hidden among you.   
  
Don't worry...I'm not going to let them win. I've figured out a way to stop them. Well, to be perfectly honest I've only managed to figure how to stop myself. How to stop them from using me to hurt you. It may not be the best way. But I'm tired and I've run out of ideas. Know that this is me doing this. The Alex Whitman you've always known and loved. The guy at one time or another you've poked fun at and trusted with your lives. I am doing this for you. When I'm gone it'll be one less threat to deal with. I doubt they'll try this approach after such an abundant failure. I sincerely hope so.   
  
Liz and Maria. My life has been all the richer for simply having known you. We've had the best time of our lives together. I know that you will have so much more. I'm just sorry I can't be there to see them. You are my sisters. I love and care for you both with all my heart and I beg for you to understand. I had to do this.   
  
Max, Michael. I know you didn't want to me to know the secret, but over the last year I've proven myself haven't I? I kept it safe, gave my blood for the reassurance that it would be kept safe. I give you my blood again. All of it. Just to keep you safe. Proof that I keep my word.   
  
Kyle and Tess. You two came into the game pretty late. I don't know you both that well but I want you to be sure that I'm doing this for you too.   
  
Isabel...  
  
What can I say? I told you I'd do anything to protect you. I am a man of my word. I am doing everything to protect you. My life doesn't matter compared to yours...and...  
  
Getting harder to control my arm...I...can't....  
  
They're getting louder. They demand action. They want you dead. They want the granolith and they want it now...  
  
Too much...I can't take it...head hurts so bad...voices   
  
Make it stop...please just make it stop...  
  
The razor is smiling at me; offering silence...Had to...no other choice...  
  
The kitchen floor is so cold...I'm so cold...pen slipping...  
  
Oh and guys, when you find me...  
  
Please take off your shoes, my mom would kill me if there were footprints all over her clean floor.   
  
-Alex 


End file.
